John McCain's thumbs-down in 2017 was the moment Republicans' promise to kill Obamacare died on the Senate floor.
Now premiums rose 20 percent in one year and Democrats just wiped out Republicans in Congress because of it.
Byron Donalds just told Republicans exactly what happens if they show up to 2028 without a plan.
GOP Healthcare Failure Kept Obamacare Alive While Premiums Climbed 129 Percent
For years, Republicans stood at every podium in America and swore to their voters that the moment they got power, Obamacare was gone.
They voted to repeal it more than 60 times while Obama was in office – knowing every single vote was theater because he would veto it.
Then 2017 arrived, and Republicans had the White House, the Senate, and the House of Representatives – every tool they needed to keep their promise.
They failed anyway.
The skinny repeal, the full repeal, the repeal-and-replace – every version died in the Senate, and McCain's vote was the knife in the back that conservatives never forgot.
Republicans went home and told voters they would fix it next time.
There was no next time.
Barack Obama stood at that podium and promised Americans their premiums would fall by $2,500 a year.
Democrats said Obamacare would make healthcare affordable for every family in America.
Instead, Obamacare premiums for a 50-year-old climbed 129 percent since 2014, according to the Paragon Health Institute.
In 2026 alone, the median ACA premium increase hit 20 percent – and insurers are now proposing another 13 to 14 percent on top of that for 2027.
That is not a healthcare system – it is a government-enforced financial chokehold on the American middle class.
Democrats spent the entire 2026 midterm campaign weaponizing those numbers, and it worked.
Democrats flipped both the House and Senate in a midterm landslide – driven in part by voters furious about healthcare costs that Republicans promised to fix and never delivered.
Byron Donalds Says Republicans Need a Healthcare Plan Before Medicare for All Gets There First
Byron Donalds is Florida's governor-elect, the future first black governor of Florida, and one of the sharpest rising voices in the Republican Party.
He went on the record Sunday and said Republican lawmakers have been "reluctant" to address healthcare publicly – and that it has to end.
"The premiums are out of control, the deductibles are out of control, the costs are out of control," Donalds said.
"We need market-centered healthcare policy that will stabilize prices in healthcare and drive down costs in healthcare."
"And Republicans, I think, for '28 and beyond, we need to step into that breach and say, 'Here's how you actually get it done on healthcare' – because if we continue under Democrat policy, it's going to continue to price out hardworking families all across America."
Trump has already proven the market approach works.
His 2019 executive order forced hospitals to publish their prices for the first time in American history – and the most expensive health service prices dropped 6.3 percent per year as a direct result, according to the Paragon Health Institute.
He came back in February 2025 and strengthened enforcement, then called on Congress to maximize price transparency as part of his Great Healthcare Plan.
American families are getting crushed between premiums they cannot afford and deductibles that rival a car payment.
Democrats' answer to that pain is Medicare for All – a complete government takeover of the American healthcare system championed by socialist Bernie Sanders and now being aggressively pushed by newly elected Michigan Senator Abdul El-Sayed.
El-Sayed appeared on ABC News Sunday morning and laid his trap immediately.
He said he would back a government healthcare takeover if Trump put his brand on it – calling it "Trump Care for All."
This is exactly how the radical Left operates.
They manufacture the crisis, offer a government solution, and then dare Republicans to explain what their alternative is.
In 2009, Republicans chose not to offer a market-based alternative to Obamacare.
They paid for that choice for 15 years.
A recent poll found that two-thirds of Americans support a single government health insurance plan – and Democrats earned that number by being the only party that ever showed up with an answer.
Republicans have never explained what market-based healthcare looks like in someone's daily life – lower premiums, more choices, real competition between providers – so voters take the only option they have ever been handed.
Democrats have been winning on healthcare for 15 years because Republicans never bothered to show up.
Donalds is telling his party it cannot afford to walk into 2028 the same way.
He ran on affordability in Florida – inflation, housing, insurance costs – and won even as Republicans got wiped out everywhere else.
Health Savings Accounts, competition across state lines, transparent hospital pricing – these are real solutions that drive costs down when markets are allowed to function.
Republicans have the better argument on healthcare.
They just need to explain what the other side's plan means in someone's life.
Medicare for All means a government bureaucrat – not your doctor – deciding whether your knee replacement is approved, whether your prescription is covered, whether the specialist you need is on the permitted list.
America already runs a government healthcare system.
It is called the VA.
Republicans have two years to offer every American something better than that future – or watch El-Sayed and his allies turn the entire American healthcare system into a government waiting room.
Sources:
- Brian Freeman, "Donalds: GOP Must Develop Healthcare Plan for 2028," Newsmax, November 8, 2026.
- Paragon Health Institute, ACA Marketplace Premium Analysis, 2026.
- Paragon Health Institute, "Shining a Light Where It Hurts: How Trump's Transparency Orders Are Dispelling Health Care Darkness," 2026.
- The Washington Times, "Trump Reinstates, Strengthens Health Care Price Transparency," February 25, 2025.
- Fox 13 Tampa Bay, "Florida Live Midterm Election Results: Byron Donalds Wins Governor's Race," November 3, 2026.